By Ben Agande & Inalegwu Shaibu

ABUJA—THE Senate, yesterday, declared that the purported order of the Federal High Court in Lagos stopping the National Assembly from carrying out further amendment to the 1999 Constitution was not binding on the National Assembly because no court of law can stop the legislature from carrying out its constitutional functions.

Deputy President of the Senate, Senator Ike Ekweremadu, who was addressing National Assembly correspondents, said the implication of the court injunction was to the effect that “the status quo, which means the amendments that have been gazetted should stand, while the court determines whether the process of the amendment to the constitution needs presidential assent.”

A Federal High Court sitting in Lagos had, Wednesday, barred the National Assembly from carrying out further amendment to the constitution pending determination of a suit filed by Mr. Olisa Agbakoba challenging the propriety of the national and state assemblies amending the constitution without presidential assent.

But in his reaction, the Deputy Senate President said since the amendment had been completed and gazetted, the court order relates to only the interpretation being sought as to whether a presidential assent is needed before constitutional amendments would come into effect.

He said: “What is at issue is whether the President will assent to the amendment of the constitution or not. It is not whether we have power to amend the constitution. It is not an issue in court.

If they are asking for the status quo to be maintained, they are simply saying that the position, as at today, should be sustained and the position as at today is that, that law has been gazetted and is in operation so it cannot stop us from doing our work.

“At any rate, the court knows, as all of us do, that the parliament cannot be stopped from exercising its constitutional functions. If we make laws, all the court can do is to declare null and void what we have done.

As far as the law making powers of the parliament is concerned, it is settled in the Supreme Court that the court will not interfere in such a manner as to stop the parliament from exercising its legislative functions. I am sure the judge knows as much as that so he wouldn’t have made an order stopping us from continuing the exercise.”

Earlier, spokesman of the Senate and Chairman, Senate Committee on Media and Information, Senator Ayogu Eze, said the status quo as far as the National Assembly is concerned, is the amendment carried out in the last exercise which had been gazetted.

He said: “That first amendment to the constitution which we have successfully carried out, subject to whatever the court may say tomorrow, has run its circle and it is in effect the status quo.

If the court says the status quo should remain, we understand it to mean that the 1999 constitution along with the first amendment constitute the status quo until somebody successfully challenges what we have done in a court of law.”

Ruling of the court

Eze said the National Assembly would continue to do its job and if any court rules that what the National Assembly had done violates the constitution, “as law_abiding citizens, we shall be bound by the ruling of the court.”

He noted that Sections 4, 9 and 53 of the 1999 Constitution vest the legislative powers of the federation in the National Assembly, adding: “No body can stop the legislature from doing its work. No court can do that.”

Justice Okechukwu Okeke, of Federal High Court Lagos had, at the hearing of a suit filed by Mr Agbakoba, on Wednesday, ordered all the parties in the suit not to do anything in respect of the amendment to the constitution

Agbakoba in his suit is asking the court to hold that the “Constitution (First Amendment) Act 2010” passed by the National Assembly cannot take effect as law without the assent of the President.

He said the exercise by the lawmakers without the assent of the President was illegal and unconstitutional.

While urging the court to nullify the amendments on the grounds that the National Assembly had contravened section 58 of the 1999 Constitution, he further asked the court to hold that in view of provisions of section 58 (1) of the 1999 Constitution, the assent of the President was a prerequisite before the amendments can become law.

Agbakoba argued: “Unless the assent of the President is overridden in pursuant to section 58 (5) of the constitution, Jonathan’s assent is sacrosanct before the amendments become law.”

He wants the court to declare that the exclusion, by the first defendant (National Assembly), of the assent of the President from the process of alteration of the constitution, unless section 58 (5)  of the 1999 constitution is complied with, renders the “Constitution (First Amendment) Act 2010” embodying such altered provisions unconstitutional, null and void.”